The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of June 3, 2023

A Lady with Three Suitors

c. 1500

France, 16th century

Pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash, with traces of black chalk

Watermarks: Wheel, similar to Briquet, 1923, no. 13389

Support: Cream(3) laid paper

Sheet: 23 x 19.3 cm (9 1/16 x 7 5/8 in.)

John L. Severance Fund 1956.40

Location

not on view

Fun Fact

The simple background and lack of landscape detail in this drawing suggest that the image may have been a model for a tapestry or other textile.

Description

This mysterious drawing shows an encounter between elegantly dressed members of the noble class. The French inscription above the image suggests that the woman is addressing her suitors and makes it clear that they are concerned with the pursuit of love: He who will conquer my love / This [barrier] must overcome / Neither destroying it nor loosening it / Going neither below it nor above. The style of the clothing reflects French court fashions during the reign of Charles VIII (1483–98), and the subject relates to the tradition of late medieval collections of love riddles that involved verbal exchanges between courtly ladies and gentlemen.

Inscriptions

Inscription

upper center, in brown ink: Celuy mamour conquestera / qui deca ce laß passera / Sanß lempirer ne desnouer / sanß dessuß ne dessoubz passez

Provenance
?-probably by 1507
Antonio Badile II [1424-1507], Verona 1
?-?
Ludovico Moscardo, Verona, by descent to Teresa Moscardo 2
?-?
Teresa Moscardo [1747-?], Verona, by descent to last Moscardo heir, Count Mario Miniscalchi-Brizzo
?-around 1905
Count Mario Miniscalchi-Erizzo [1881-1957], Verona, sold to private collection
1905-?
Private collection, by descent
?-?
Luigi Grassi [1858-1937], Florence
around 1954-1956
(Francis Matthiesen, London, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH)
1956-
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Provenance Footnotes

1 According to Byam Shaw 1983, 214 n. 1.
2 The Moscardo provenance given here was proposed by Evelyn Karet in "Stefano da Verona, Felice Feliciano, and the First Renaissance Collection of Drawings," Arte Lombarda 124 (1998), 31-52. The traditional provenance of drawings from the Moscardo collection includes the Marquis of Calzolari as one of the former owners (first proposed by Frits Lugt, Lugt supplement 1171b), but according to Coner Fahy (Printing a Book at Verona: The Account Book of Francesco Calzolari Junior [Paris, 1993]), that is incorrect.
Citations
The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 578 archive.org
"Accessions of American and Canadian Museums, April - June 1958." The Art Quarterly 21, no. 3 (Autumn 1958). Mentioned and reproduced: p. 336
The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 75 archive.org
Wixom, William D. Treasures from Medieval France. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1967. Mentioned: p. 314, no. VII 11; Reproduced: p. 315 archive.org
The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 75 archive.org
Huizinga, Johan. The Waning Middle Ages. Exh. Cat. Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Museum of Art, 1969. Mentioned: pp. 43-44, no. 38; Reproduced: plate LXVIII
Levin, William R. Images of Love and Death in Late Medieval and Renaissance Art. Exh. Cat. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Museum of Art, 1975. Mentioned: p. 97, no. 58; Reproduced: plate IX
The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 84 archive.org
Byam Shaw, James. The Italian Drawings of the Frits Lugt Collection. Paris: Fondation Custodia, 1983. Mentioned: vol. 1, p. 214 n. 1
Muylle, Jan. "Big Fishes Eat Little Fishes by Pieter Bruegel after Hieronymus Bosch (?): A Question of Interpretation." In Le dessin sous-jacent dans la peinture. Edited by Roger van Schoute and Dominique Hollanders-Favart. Louvain: Université catholique de Louvain, 1985. Mentioned: p. 131; Reproduced: plate 48
Tortora, Phyllis G. and Keith Eubank. Survey of Historic Costume: A History of Western Dress. 2nd edition. New York: Fairchild Publications, 1994. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 156
Backhouse, Janet and Yves Giraud. Pierre Sala: Petit livre d'amour. Lucerne: Faksimile Verlag, 1994. Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 138-139
"Drawings on Exhibition." Drawing 16, no. 6 (March - April 1995): 131-133. Mentioned: p. 131
Dunbar, Burton L. and Edward J. Olszewski, eds. Drawings in Midwestern Collections: Volume I, Early Works. Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1996. Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 117-119, no. 22
DeGrazia, Diane, and Carter E. Foster. Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Exh. Cat. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2000. Mentioned: pp. 90-91, p. 287, no. 32; Reproduced: p. 91
Karet, Evelyn and Peter Windows. "The Antonio II Badile Album of Drawings: A Reconstruction of an Early Sixteenth Century Collection." Arte Lombarda 145, no. 3 (2005): 23-56. Mentioned: pp. 26, pp. 37-38, no. 12v [47]; Reproduced: p. 37, no. 29
Karet, Evelyn. The Antonio II Badile Album of Drawings: The Origins of Collecting Drawings in Early Modern Northern Italy. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2014. Reproduced: p. 95; mentioned: p. 96, fig. 3.31
Exhibition history

Department of Prints and Drawings Opening Exhibition. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (March 3, 1958-October 11, 1959).

Drawings from the Museum Collection: 15th-17th Centuries. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 18-October 11, 1960).

Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 11-September 10, 1963).

Prints and Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 6-September 9, 1965).

Treasures of Medieval France. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 16, 1966-January 29, 1967).

The Waning Middle Ages. Spencer Museum of Art, Lawrence, KS (organizer) (November 1-December 1, 1969).

Images of Love and Death in Late Medieval and Renaissance Art. University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, MI (organizer) (October 23-January 22, 1976).

Northern European Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 16, 1982-January 9, 1983).

Treasures on Paper. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 10-July 24, 1988).

French Drawings from the Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 13, 1994-March 12, 1995).

Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 27-October 17, 2000); The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY (May 23-August 19, 2001); Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, TX (October 14, 2001-January 6, 2002).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1956.40